Felipe Quispe Huanca
Felipe Quispe Huanca (called El Mallku) (* 1942 in Ajillata Grande , Omasuyos Province , La Paz Department , Bolivia ) is a leading figure in the indigenous movement in Bolivia. He is Aymara and leader of the Movimiento Indígena Pachakuti .
Life
“He was born in 1942 on the shores of Lake Titicaca in Ajillata Grande, a small village in the province of Omasuyos in the La Paz department, as the last of six siblings. Father Gabino Quispe and mother Leandra Hunaca were impoverished farmers.
Felipe Quispe finished primary school in nearby Santiago de Huata . From an early age he helped his parents with farm work. He did his military service in 1963 in the air force in tropical Riberalta . He then worked in Ajaria Chico , where he married Vicenta Mamani in 1966. The marriage had seven children, two of whom died. Better earning opportunities drove Quispe to the tropical lowlands, where he worked on sugar, cotton and rice plantations. In 1971 he began to work in a union. He later stayed in Peru and Guatemala for two years . After returning to Bolivia, he joined the Movimiento Indio Túpac Katari (MITKA) movement. Shortly afterwards (1988) he drew attention to himself as the leader of the Indian and Marxist political group Ofensiva Roja de Ayullus Kataristas . "
As the armed arm of MITKA, Quispe Huanca founded the indigenous guerrilla Ejército Guerrillero Túpac Katari (EGTK) in 1990 together with the current Vice President Álvaro García Linera .
From 1992 to 1997 he was in prison.
“In the detention center, the fifty-year-old caught up on high school and high school and took up distance learning. He graduated in history from the University Mayor de San Andrés in La Paz. "
“Between 1998 and 2006 he was Secretary General of the Bolivian Agricultural Workers Association CSUTCB, the most important indigenous campesino organization. From this position he became the central figure in the uprisings that overthrew three governments between 2000 and 2005 and ultimately made the election of Evo Morales possible. "
In the presidential elections in Bolivia in 2002 , he received 6.1% of the vote as a candidate for the Movimiento Indígena Pachakuti.
aims
The Pachakuti movement strives for the "free self-determination" of the indigenous people.
“We gave birth to the idea of free self-determination for the nation of the Aymara - Quechuas , the nation of the Indians. We have our symbols and during the uprising in 2000 we purged Achacachi […] from the state: we threw out the police, the judges, all the institutions and installed our own authorities. But we were only self-administered for a very short time, because Evo [Morales] has reinstated the military and the police. Our self-determination means: our own state, our territory, our army and our laws. "
Attitude to the Morales government
In Quispe's view, President Evo Morales is an “adapted Indio”, and his government does not adequately represent indigenous interests.
“Had we really taken power, we would now have ministers and ambassadors speaking Aymara or Quechua . The army chief and the police chief would have surnames like Mamani or Condori, that would have been a real change. But the current government is indebted to non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other countries, and all these people are now presenting their bills to be paid. The energy minister Carlos Villegas previously worked for NGOs, the ministries for mining and labor are occupied by former representatives of the traditional parties, and the few Indians who were in the government, such as the former education minister Félix Patzi or the water minister Abel Mamani, have been replaced. The only Indian in the government palace is Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca .
I think Evo is much more of a doll of the traditional left, and they are oligarchical in Bolivia. I don't see that she is on the way to radical change in the country. These are the sons of the landowners and entrepreneurs, some say they are 'right-wing', others say they are 'left-wing', and sometimes they quarrel with each other, but in practice this distinction does not exist in Bolivia. "
Accusation of racism
Quispe's discourse is seen as racist by some observers. Quispe himself thinks of the charge of "reverse racism":
“First of all you have to see that we Indians are not the racist exploiters - we have no white domestic workers, and neither do we have white chauffeurs. I think if the whites accept the rules of the Indians, we would be crazy if we killed them or deported them. We are neither the Ku Klux Clan nor German Nazis, on the contrary, we absolutely disagree with this way of thinking. In my opinion, in this 21st century, a 'race war' in this sense would also be a political suicide. Today we have human rights and the international court of justice and what we are doing is protest. Because it's been so many years now, from colonial times to the republic to today, that we are insulted, belittled and discriminated against, it hurts a bit. "
Texts and interviews
German
- We live in the middle of a crude racism. On the relationship between majority and minority in Bolivia in: Jahrbuch für Antisemitismusforschung 14 (2005), pp. 347–354
- Interview with Narco News magazine; No. 17, 2002 online
- We are mortal enemies and we always will be . Interview with the radical indigenous activist Felipe Quispe Huanca in: Latin America News Issue 411/412 - September / October 2008 http ://latein Amerika-nachrichten.de/?aaartikel=wir-sind-todfeinde-und-haben-es-immer- Remember last accessed on 13 July 2015 - with the deadly enemies the landowners are meant.
Spanish
- Túpak Katari vive y vuelve, carajo (Túpak Katari lives and returns, damn it), published anonymously in 1988
- El indio en escena , La Paz: Ed. Pachakuti, 1999
- Mi Captura , La Paz: Ed. Pachakuti, 2007
literature
- Ulrich Goedeking: The Power of Political Discourses: Indigenous Movement, Local Protests and the Politics of Indigenous Leaders in Bolivia in: INDIANA 17/18 (2000/2001), pp. 83-104 online (PDF; 228 kB)
Web links
- Annie Murphy Felipe Quispe: The Other (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Preliminary remark by the translator Hans Huber Abendroth on Quispe 2005
- ↑ cf. the preliminary remarks by the translator Hans Huber Abendroth on Quispe 2005 and the introduction to Quispe 2008
- ↑ Introduction to Quispe 2008
- ↑ a b c Quispe 2008
- ↑ cf. z. B. Goedeking 2000/2001: 86
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Huanca, Felipe Quispe |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Bolivian personality of the indigenous movement in Bolivia |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1942 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ajillata Grande , Omasuyos Province , La Paz Department, Bolivia |